


In a flash

by jest_voyage



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Catra is Whipped (She-Ra), F/F, Fluff, Jock Adora, Lesbian Disaster Catra (She-Ra), Oblivious Adora (She-Ra), Okay A Lot, Sexual Tension, Stalkerish Tendencies, angst because what is a catradora au without it, bad attempts at flirting, catra is a bit of a troublemaker, imagine communicating, internalized as well as external homophobia, shadow weaver exists here what more can i say
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 19:00:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29212299
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jest_voyage/pseuds/jest_voyage
Summary: Catra can't help it. Really— she'd tried to convince herself that waiting here every day for a simple glance at the girl was weird enough. But alas, she feels her hand slip into her pocket, numb fingers finding her the edges of her phone. As she watches in awe as the half-stranger staggers away, she subtly raises her phone in an attempt to get a picture of the girl. Her hand trembles as her camera aligns with the sight in front of her. She'd promised Scorpia some proof.And fuck. The flash goes off.Adora turns. Catra sees red.
Relationships: Adora & Catra (She-Ra), Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 69





	In a flash

**Author's Note:**

> hi! it's been a while since I've written anything even remotely close to a draft, so I am excited to jump straight into another fic! depending on what people end up thinking, I may stretch it long term. have a lovely day (:

Bringing a warm cigarette to her lips, yellow and gold eyes watch as a puff of smoke rises steadfast into the winter air. It is quickly enveloped by the surrounding bite of the breeze and vanishes in an instant, and Catra can only close her eyes as she lays back on the courtyard steps. Her ear twitches from the excess of noise erupting around her as people pushed through the front doors of the school to make their way outisde, wind brushing her fur softly. It's not too unbearably cold out today, what with sports practices and student crowds still persisting. A concerning volume of students (most notably underclassmen) spent far too much time keeping track of local sports, a feat that Catra could never begin to understand. It was mid January and the football season had come early due to some scheduling errors way back in the spring.

It doesn't seem to bother the students much as they idly push their way to the stands. Catra's fingers feel numb around her smoke, and she pushes the head of it into the concrete beside her, effectively silencing its orange glow. A student glared at her from ways down the steps, obviously annoyed with the high volume of smoke carried by the breeze. She gives him the bird and it seems to shut him up, sinking back into his jacket and turning away from the brooding girl. It's not that she necessarily liked smoking— it was just a habit that had persisted into her teenage years, picked up on from a deadbeat aunt. Just because she was dead and gone didn't mean this had to be. And now that she was finally of age, it seemed pretty natural to whip one out when the situation called for it.

Said situation being watching closely as groups of students migrated from the cafeteria to the school's football field, laughter and cursing and small talk filling the empty wisps of the chilly air. Fur bristling at the feeling of the unwelcome breeze enrapturing her, Catra sunk further into her jacket and willed herself to suck it up. It certainly didn't help how many people were gathered around the outskirts of the school, buzzing with excitement.

Though Catra was safely out of range of the judging eyes of her classmates, she could still feel herself shiver uncomfortably. Sure, she liked watching the people go by. Seeing a whole new side of a person when they thought no one was watching— it was a guilty pleasure Catra had admittedly taken part in countless times. The way Sean Hawk clung to his girlfriend's side like a puppy, none of his prettyboy friends there to give him shit for it. Perfuma stopping by her car to pocket a small plastic bag of hell knows what, (gods, everyone knew she was a stoner) and watching as dozens of couples disappeared behind the bleachers and the woods surrounding the school with obvious intention. Perhaps her favorite part of simply sitting back and listening was hearing bits and pieces of dramatic gossip weave through her skillful ears as people passed by. It was certainly better than being part of it.

Yeah, kicking back and surveying the entire student body flocking carelessly toward their quarterfinal game was definitely high on her list of ways to satiate her undying boredom. Keyword being surveying.. not getting involved. To Catra, being seen by other people was a whole other ballgame.

She wasn't exactly a school favorite. Sure, she had her enemies but she wasn't really on anyone's hit list.. she mostly just kept to herself, wreaking havoc whenever possible. Said havoc being quite the resume. Her strange interest in graffiti, whether it be in the form of sharpies on the bathroom stalls or sloppy strokes of spraypaint behind the trashcans at the back of the school. Maybe she just wanted to leave a mark. Or maybe that time she set her science teacher's wastebin on fire out of sheer curiosity alone. Or when she slipped the class hamster into her pocket and strolled out of her shitfaced math teacher's room with an innocent grin on her face— okay, maybe she was a bit of a troublemaker.

But she was sitting here.. harmlessly. Swear on it. Even if some untrusting teacher's gazes flicked her over as they made their way to their cars, they could speculate all they wanted. She was just observing; the catgirl still hadn't quite grown out of her tendency to people watch, a strange habit that had persisted ever since she was a kit. She admired things from a distance, not too headfast or overbearing as to go out of her way and join in on the festivities.

She didn't have much school spirit to make up for that, either. She was yet to attend a single football game or anything of the sort even despite her high school holding many, many impressive titles in their clubs and athletic department. She didn't really give two shits about any of that.

It was a horrible cliche, sure— but fuck this godforsaken place. School was yet another obstacle to her remiss lifestyle (though the superintendent liked to call it delinquitive and unruly) and aside from attending it like any other teenager, the last thing she wanted to do was spend any time here than was strictly necessary. Or rather, more than was required of her.

This instance, of course, was the exception.

Catra rustles through the pockets of her jacket for her phone, seeking some brief entertainment. Watching the beefcakes spill icy water over each other's bodies (inciting hilariously girlish squeals) isn't quite doing the trick. She's not sitting here freezing her tail off without reason, though it seemed she may be waiting here a while.

She's waiting on someone. She wouldn't call her a friend, nor an enemy, (she wasn't planning on jumping anyone!) or even anything remotely associating the two. Again, she was observing. That's all.

Okay. Maybe, in this case, that was an understatement. Granted, there's probably better ways she could be spending her senior year rather than wrapped up in the simple sight of a pretty girl. A girl she doesn't know, to be perfectly clear. And just because she's always wearing that stupid red and blue checkered flannel (okay it's not stupid, in fact it's unfairly breathtaking how the sleeves hug her muscled shoulders) it doesn't make her a lesbian. Or even remotely interested in girls.

It's wrong to just assume things like that. To allow such wishful thinking to invade her hopeless mind— but Catra just sits and watches anyway.

It's hard to tell much about a person simply by the way they walk a couple yards, but Catra's pretty sure she has it down. Every afternoon Adora Grayskull would push her way through the gym doors for various (though always rushed and seemingly urgent) reasons. When the blonde makes for her car, more often than not she's lugging heavy textbooks for either herself or her friends that accompany her. She's running late to god knows where, fumbling with her keys or nearly running over herself in such a rush. Those little details alone tells Catra a lot of things.

Adora's a pushover. She lets people walk all over her so long as they give her the validation and appreciation she so desperately craves. She can see it in her steel blue eyes as her companions proceed to thank her for her (rather unnecessary) manual labor. The way her smile grows brighter at their empty cognizance only proves just as much. Okay— maybe she was really strong and Catra certainly didn't mind squinting carefully to get a better look at those rippling muscles— but that was besides the point. Her constant overexertion is probably due to the fact that she's painfully over-the-top, judging by that stupidly large bright moon logo plastered to the back of her car with her name on it, and would probably give any stupid thing her all. She has to prove herself more than anything. Or thought she probably got that stupid thought nailed into her head, anyway.

And yeah, Adora is downright gorgeous. She didn't need to be some observant genius to figure that one out. Everybody knows it and everybody's probably had a jab at her. Not that she really knows anything about Adora aside from what she'd observed- malicious rumors and one's university 'reputation' was never quite worth listening to. But it was sort of given. Nobody walked around so alluringly without drawing the attention of their peers. She'd certainly caught Catra's eye, after all. She could gladly admit she was always too wrapped up in her own shit to even bat an eye at anyone. 

And judging by the way she's sprinting to the fields some thirty minutes after the last bell of the day, (wait.. wasn't the game supposed to start in fifteen minutes?) Adora's irresponsible. Sure, to an outsider not quite as aware and observant as Catra it may seem like she had her whole life together. She didn't. She'd seen the girl forget her cleats one too many times— and then her shinguards, then her socks.. she'd burst out of the building in a full on sprint, hair disheveled and bags prominent under her eyes like she'd just taken a power nap on a desk.

Catra laughs at the thought. It's fascinating, really, how much you can tell about a person simply by their afterschool routine. Some things far more obvious than others. Maybe the girl was just very easy to read.

Did she mention Adora's clumsy? It's adorable, really. Watching her jumble around in the parking lot day after day like it's practiced. It gives her a sense of humanity underneath that spotless exterior, tripping over her own feet, eyes darting around desperately to catch if anyone noticed. The soft pink blush of embarrassment on her cheeks when she'd dusted herself off after faceplanting into the concrete thanks to a pair of untied laces. (She never thought that far ahead.)

Perhaps most unsurprisingly— Adora is kind. Painfully altruistic. She watches her wave cars by and wait patiently for a safe opening even when she's devastatingly late. She greets teachers and students so genuinely it's almost painful, seeing as they'd never fully reciprocate it. Though people may take advantage of her kindness from time to time, she genuinely enjoys helping them despite gaining no reward for her struggles. Catra can see it in the way she glows when she's accomplished a seemingly insignificant task. She rushes a young boy back into the the arms of his mother after he ran off toward the fields, chasing the car with those long midfielder strides after his mother nearly drove off without him. Perhaps that's what Catra finds most fascinating about Adora. How even when she thinks nobody is looking, (and someone is) she remains true to herself.

Adora isn't perfect and she has fears and insecurities— phone pressed against her ear with shaking hands, promising the person on the other line that she'd do better. Be better. Mumbling scolds and words of inspiration to herself on her way to practice, perhaps to class in preparation of an upcoming test. A telltale game. Adora is kind and flawed she's not perfect and she'll never be perfect. Catra likes that about her.

And still, the blonde was devastatingly mainstream when it came to high school hierarchies. She can already imagine some douchebag guy the girl is wrapped up in— an untimely relationship she maintains for the sake of "loving him." Probably met in middle school, the guy got rejected plenty of times before the she finally gave in for the sake of losing their friendship or.. some other stupid reason. Maybe a jock— a pretentious athlete, six feet tall and disgustingly self absorbed— probably needed a boost on the social ladder. She doesn't put the possibility out of the question considering this was clearly one of the prettiest girls Catra had ever seen. 

She quietly watches the blonde twirl her keys around her wrist while trudging to her car. (No way that's a jeep. That's adorable. How had she never noticed that before? Ugh, cut it out!) Even with how much Catra seemed to bode with Adora's personality, the simple thought of even being friends with this girl already seemed out of reach.. unattainable. The mutinous grunge lesbian with a blotched school record, seen even remotely close to this stunning, universally sought-after (and jacked, Jesus Christ) blonde was probably against the laws of well... life. Even being in her presence probably set off dozens of alarms.

Okay, maybe falsely producing this girl's life story was a bit creepy. When she catches the eye of this stranger from time to time, she can't help but blush at how intrusive she was probably being. Thoughts were just thoughts but.. there was really no reason for her to be feeling this way. They weren't friends, they'd never spoken, they probably never would. So who was she to psychoanalyze Adora? A girl who probably didn't even know her name— much less her face.

And yet Catra clings tight to this fascination anyway. She perches herself at the bottom of the school's front steps at the same time every day at the sound of the last bell, scrolling through her home screen idly. She'd wait around ten to fifteen minutes depending on the day— the blonde would either run across campus devastatingly late to soccer practice (Did she mention the girl played soccer? Yeah. There's that) or saunter off to her jeep with a little more pep in her step than Catra could ever manage.

Today, the girl takes a different route. Instead of her usual destination rushing to the parking lot or to practice, she works her way back toward the school. Catra's ear twitches at the unforeseen development, leaning forward on her haunches. She wonders if her eyes deceive her as she suddenly realizes that it's none other than Adora that is passing her. Fast.

Briefly, the blonde stops somewhere nearby to gather the belongings stuffed in her arms. A couple textbooks and a bookbag. She's not necessarily straining with the effort, but they've slowed her down quite considerably.

Catra can't help it. Really— she'd tried to convince herself that waiting here every day for a simple glance at the girl was weird enough. But alas, she feels her hand slip into her pocket, numb fingers finding her the edges of her phone. As she watches in awe as the half-stranger staggers away, she subtly raises her phone in an attempt to get a picture of the girl. Her hand trembles as her camera aligns with the sight in front of her. She'd promised Scorpia some proof.

And fuck. The flash goes off.

Adora turns. Catra sees red.

And Catra certainly wasn't swift enough to hide the fact she'd been looking straight at her. Fuck, she feels her head go numb as she wonders if Adora had caught her— had finally came to confront her about her staring problem. Not only that— the clear picture she'd just taken of her. Yeah, she probably deserved it.

Instead, as the girl scales the steps and stands in front of Catra, no bite comes. Instead, as Catra lifts her head nervously to meet her gaze, she's left starstruck. The girl offers her a bright smile that only further accentuates the blues of her eyes, the warm dimples at the corners of her lips. Bet she wouldn't be smiling if she knew Catra were removing the sleeves of that flannel with her eyes alone. Gods, was that weird? Catra decides on pulling her beanie a little lower on her face, squishing her ears against her skull. It covered the heavy gaze of her eyes and hopefully her burning face.

"Catra, right?"

The catgirl blinks once, then twice. Her mouth going dry in complete disbelief— no way was this girl talking to her. No, more so going out of her way to do so. Maybe this girl was reaching into her dreams again.. though digging a claw into her leg to prove the statement true didn't seem to do the trick. Maybe she'd come over to scold her about the photo? It was a clear and creepy breach of privacy between strangers-- she had every right to do so, of course. She may as well surrender herself now. Have the superintendent put her in cuffs.

But Adora just.. smiled. In an almost familiar way, not to mention (god knows how) she knew her name. Adora just said her name, perfect pronunciation and all like it was practiced. Natural. Sure, it's not like she was so much an outcast that it was a surprise that this girl knew her from somewhere (her permanent record was no secret) she just hadn't imagined it would sound so good rolling off her tongue. In this moment Catra decided it wasn't worth hearing anyone else say it. 

"Um.. yeah." Is all she can manage. She raises her head, slowly, meeting eyes with the girl again, who seems to be observing her closely. Too closely. Not that she's minding the attention from Adora at all.. it's certainly more than she'd ever expected or probably deserved. But being anywhere near this girl was only going to cause problems. It certainly wasn't the first time associating with the higher up had brought her into some deep shit. Pretty girl or not.

Again, watching from afar was her thing. Not getting involved. Adora talking to her? Catching her in the act of admiration? That was definitely getting involved. 

"Woah." Her lips part alluringly as Catra lifts her beanie slightly to meet her gaze. "Your eyes are different colors— wow! That's incredible. I thought it was just the light." Course her voice borders on soprano but maintains a rugged overtone; it travels through Catra's ears like a recital in itself. The catgirl seems awestruck by the revelation, and Catra blinks again as if taking the compliment with the gesture alone. Did Adora just call her eyes incredible? Did she she not forget what just happened only moments ago? Catra had snapped a photo-- like a total creep. Without her permission. Adora hadn't said a word about it.

Not to mention being a hybrid usually only got her strange stares. Uncomfortable impressions. Maybe it was Adora's compulsive kindness that possessed her to say such a thing, but she couldn't help but feel her face warm anyway. Nobody ever complimented her strange appearance, only acknowledged it in a sort of "she looks like a science experiment" kind of way. 

She's honestly not sure what to say to that. Not that she could possibly find her voice to attempt to speak anyway— not when the girl before her was hogging all the oxygen between them. Words lodged in the back of her throat, all she can manage is a lame shrug. She wants to die. Painfully.

"Sorry. That was a little weird, I'll admit." Adora chuckles nervously, throaty and burnished. Adora was talking about _weird?_ Really? Dear god. Catra knows there's no way that girl could be so beautiful; so physically captivating— certainly not so effortlessly. And even worse, there's no way she could be so painfully fucking oblivious to what was going on here. There had to be some catch in the reality of the sheer existence of the downright quintessential being standing before her, not yelling at her and calling her a freak. Warm blue eyes tearing into her every thought.

"You're gonna be in Mr Damon's study hall next week, right?" Adora asks through the burgundy scarf wrapped carefully around her neck and mouth.

She wonders how she knows that, momentarily. She can't find it in herself to care as she nods simply, words still failing her. She must've looked like an idiot. Well, she was, wasn't she? One big stupid lesbian idiot. 

"Awesome! Uh..." Adora checks her watch with a gasp, "Oh, shoot!" (Catra _knew_ she didn't curse. It had been a hunch.)

"I've gotta go, I have to go warm up!" Adora mumbles, palm slapping against her forehead. Catra knows that. She pretends not to. Adora turns to her and offers her one last smile. "Maybe I'll see you around, Catra?"

"Yeah. See you." She manages.

And then Adora is gone in an instant, that same pep in her step more prominent than before as she turns towards the fields, backpack slung lazily over her shoulder.

Catra can feel her body numb as if processing what had just happened. Phone still in her hand, held tightly, defensively-- she swallowed hard as she dared to look at the photo. Adora is gathering her belongings, as such, but she certainly hadn't missed the glint in Adora's eye as she glanced behind her, directly at Catra, before she'd even taken the photo.


End file.
